The way to fight for this kind of world is to be yourself, to do what you love, and to raise yourself to your highest potentials. In order to do so, you need to be free from the fear of not making enough money.

That’s why it’s important to cultivate a simple lifestyle. My favorite author Austin Kleon, whose books on creativity Steal Like an Artist and Show Your Work inspired me to start this blog, gave out this advice:

Live within Your Means + Do What You Love = Time Bomb

So Live UNDER Your Means

This doesn’t mean that you need now to live under a seashell and eat 3 grains of salt for dinner. But this does mean that you need to understand the difference between NEED and WANT. We want a lot of things. I want to go to Pune India to learn yoga for 3 months at B. K. S, Iyengar Institute. I want to learn meditation in the best zendo in Japan.

1. Would I die or would my well-being be harmed without them? No.

2. Do I have the money now to do so? Yes.

3. Would I be so broke after this experience that I will have to work to feed myself, thus not being able to write? Yes.

Do I do it or not? No.

You get the point. I learned a crucial lesson that we will never get enough of what we don’t need. So what do we need to survive and to work? My list includes:

Nutritious food; a small, clean, airy room with window where I can sleep safely; blankets and a mattress; comfortable clothes that can keep my body temperature; laptop; notebook; pen; an internet contract; books; coffee; and a few kitchen basics for cooking.

Simple living isn’t a torment or a punishment. It is a lifestyle choice.

In the last 4 months, I have lived without a paycheck. I’ve been using my saving from last year to buy time – the thing I need the most – to get better at my craft. To live under my means, I stay with my parents. I ride bicycle instead of bike to save money on fuel, to exercise and live green. I cook. I’m not ashamed to admit this. I wrote at least 1000 words per day in the last 120 days, and have made leaps in my writing craft. Each dollar I spend on things I don’t need pulls me a bit further away from the freedom to do what I love.

“The best feeling is to spend the money that I earned by myself,” a girl once said to me. I was certain that she had never experienced the feeling of doing what she loved. Because she wasn’t doing what she loved, the poverty inside her compelled her to take pleasure at the cash register. When you’re following your passion, living with your parents, or receiving supports form them, in order to have the time to improve your craft wouldn’t bother you so much.

We are ungrateful leeches to our parents only when we cease to raise ourselves to our highest potentials. Had Steve Jobs be too proud to do what he loved in his parents’ garage, he wouldn’t have revolutionized 6 industries and Apple, the most valuable company in the world, wouldn’t have existed.

This is important to understand when we are young. You are well-off? Great! Your parents are well-off? Wonderful! Take no shame in that. You have the tools to follow your dreams and serve others. You have more advantages, so work harder. The world needs that.